The concrete path baked under the afternoon sun as Mark walked away from the campus convenience store. He tucked his hands into his pockets. One piece of the puzzle was secured. Jake was a choreographer. That was a big, unexpected advantage.
Now he needed to break into the second faction. He needed leverage on Chloe.
Approaching her directly was a guaranteed failure. She was at the absolute center of her social circle, completely shielded by her trendy friends. If a nobody like him walked up and asked personal questions, she would shut him down instantly.
He had to attack the perimeter and needed a weak link.
There were exactly six persons in Chloe's fashion-obsessed clique. Mark had observed their habits over the past few weeks. Every Wednesday, the university enforced a free-uniform policy. Five of those girls treated it like a runway, showing off expensive brands and flashy new accessories to assert their social dominance.
One of them did not.
Her name was Anna. While the others wore fresh seasonal outfits, Anna always cycled through the same three plain sweaters and generic denim skirts. She stood right beside them, laughing and talking, but the financial gap was obvious. She was struggling to keep up with the steep cost of their lifestyle. That subtle, unspoken division made her the optimal target.
He found her sitting alone on a shaded bench near the library. She held a thick paperback book, her eyes scanning the pages.
"Anna," Mark called out, stopping a few feet away from the wood. "Do you have a minute?"
She looked up and away her focus. "You're Mark, right?"
"Yes. I'm glad you know my name."
"Of course," Anna replied, closing her book and resting it on her lap. "We are classmates. Do you need something from me?"
Mark didn't waste time with pointless small talk. He leaned against the stone pillar next to the bench. "Actually, yes. I want us to join the dance contest."
Anna tilted her head, a confused frown pulling at her features. "But we are joining. Remember? Jake said we would meet up one week before the deadline."
"I mean joining seriously," Mark clarified.
Her eyes widened. The casual friendliness vanished, replaced by a sudden, heavy seriousness.
"That's impossible." She looked down at her hands, her shoulders slumping slightly. "No one seems to be interested. It's a lost cause."
He watched her disappointment. She actually cared about the competition, but she lacked the social power to oppose Chloe and Jake.
"Actually," Mark said, shifting his tone to sound slightly hesitant. "I wanna ask something else."
Anna looked back up. "What do you wanna ask?"
"I need information about Chloe."
Anna's eyes narrowed instantly. She sat up straighter, her gaze turning highly suspicious. She glanced over her left shoulder, then her right, making sure the courtyard was empty and leaned forward.
"Don't tell me you have a crush on her?" Anna whispered.
Mark did not answer.
He let his eyes drop to the dirt path. He shifted his weight and rubbed the back of his neck with one hand. It was a perfect simulation of a flustered, embarrassed teenage boy caught in a lie.
He was applying a basic psychological tactic he learned from observing Reine's methods. If he told Anna he wanted to manipulate Chloe to secure a high-stakes dance competition, her tribal instincts would flare.
She would raise her defensive walls and report him to her friend immediately. But a crush is a completely harmless, universally understood vulnerability. It lowers the threat level to zero.
By staying completely silent and looking away, he forced Anna's brain to fill in the blank. The human mind hates unresolved patterns. It always jumps to the most dramatic, socially satisfying conclusion.
Anna wanted a romantic secret, so Mark's silence simply handed her a blank canvas to paint it on. People naturally trust the conclusions they reach themselves far more than any truth they are told.
"So you do have a crush on her," Anna smiled wide, a spark of excitement lighting up her face. "Silence means yes. I knew it."
Mark kept his head down. "Does she like someone? Or maybe... is there someone she respects a lot?"
Anna leaned back and looked completely satisfied. She felt an immediate, overwhelming obligation to tell him the truth.
It was a simple social reflex. By presenting himself as a helpless, embarrassed boy seeking romantic advice, he shifted the power dynamic entirely in her favor. Gossiping about a friend's harmless preferences costs her nothing financially or socially.
Instead, it rewards her with a huge spike of social currency. She gets to play the wise matchmaker. She gets a feeling of control over a secret. The need to feel useful and superior compelled her to open her mouth.
"Listen, this is not a secret," Anna said, her voice dropping into a conspiratorial whisper. "Chloe has no boyfriend. She has no crush on anyone right now. But about someone she respects? There is one person."
Mark kept his face carefully neutral, but a sharp thrill hit his chest. He remembered the strange captions on Chloe's F-book account.
*Thanking a certain person which I owe my current life.*
He was almost positive Anna was about to name that exact benefactor.
"Who?" Mark asked quickly. "What is this person's name?"
"I don't know," Anna shrugged.
Mark frowned. The logic completely derailed. "You don't know?"
"I don't know the name," Anna repeated, shaking her head. "And don't be surprised. Chloe doesn't know either."
"What?" Mark asked, genuinely confused now. "I don't think I follow."
"It was a writer," Anna explained, tracing a finger over the cover of her paperback. "An author on an app called WebBook."
Mark stared at her. "WebBook? What is that?"
"It is an online platform where you can read or write books," Anna said.
The name sounded faintly familiar. He had seen advertisements for reading apps before, but he never paid attention to them. "Tell me what you know about this WebBook and about this author."
Anna looked at him with teasing eyes. A playful smile touched her lips. "As I said, it is an online platform. I actually tried to write one book before."
Mark raised an eyebrow because he never expected the quiet girl in the fashion group to be a writer.
Anna reached into her pocket and pulled out her smartphone. Her thumb swiped across the glass. She opened an application with a dark blue interface and held the screen out toward him. "Look."
Mark took the phone. He looked at the bright screen. It displayed a novel cover featuring a painted landscape. The chapter count sat heavily at the bottom. Five hundred chapters.
"Read," Anna instructed softly.
Mark sat down on the empty space of the wooden bench and started reading. The text flowed smoothly. The dialogue felt real. He swiped through the first chapter, then the second. He read all the way until he reached chapter ten.
He stopped scrolling and let out a slow breath. This book is good. Really good. The writing was incredibly sharp.
He backed out to the main page and checked the rating. It was filled with five-star reviews. A specific number caught his eye right below the title.
"What is this thing called 'Collections'?" Mark asked, pointing at the screen. "It says it has 1000 collections."
"That means there are a thousand people who are following my book," Anna said.
"That's amazing," Mark praised her, handing the device back. "I bet you are one of the best writers on this platform."
Anna's smile completely vanished. A heavy, dark shadow fell over her face. She looked down at the dark screen.
"That's what the readers said," Anna murmured, her voice tight. "They said my book is probably one of the best they ever read. But being the best book with the best story does not mean you will be recognized on this platform."
She gripped the phone tightly. "The editors here do not care whether your book is good or bad. The rankings here do not care if you write like Shakespeare. If Shakespeare were alive today, a genius writer like him would be buried on this platform."
Mark frowned. "What? That does not make any sense. If the ranking is not based on how good your book is, then how is it being ranked?"
Anna let out a harsh, defeated sigh. "It is based entirely on how marketable your book is. It depends on how many readers you can draw in the first ten chapters and how much money you earn."
She looked out across the sunny courtyard, her eyes filled with bitter frustration.
"The ranking system of WebBook operates on pure, ruthless commercial logic," Anna explained. "It tracks user retention, daily reading minutes, and coin expenditures. Even if you are a genius writer constructing a flawless narrative, if your book does not sell fast, the mechanics of WebBook will treat your story as deadweight. It buries you at the bottom of the search results where no one will ever find you."
She dragged a hand through her hair.
"Ninety-nine percent of the readers do not care how profound or sophisticated your book is," Anna said, her voice shaking with raw emotion. "They do not care how much of a genius you are in literature. Readers only care if you can touch their emotions and spike their dopamine levels. They want cheap thrills. Fast pacing. Wish fulfillment. That's why a genius writer like Shakespeare has absolutely no chance in WebBook."
Silence fell over the bench.
Mark didn't say a word and he didn't offer fake comfort. He just sat there and let her frustration flow out into the open air. She needed to empty the anger from her lungs.
He waited a full minute. He came here for only one reason. He needed the name.
"I'm sorry," Mark finally said, keeping his tone gentle.
Anna shook her head quickly and wiped a hand across her eyes and forced a small, tired smile. "It's fine. I'm just frustrated. But I already moved on from that."
"About that person," Mark prompted quietly, steering the conversation back to the target.
"Ah, yes. Yes." Anna unlocked her phone again. Her thumb tapped the search bar. She typed a few letters and hit enter and handed the phone back to Mark.
Mark took the device and looked at the bright glass screen. It displayed a stark, minimalist author profile.
Anna looked at Mark. "That author's name is..."